Nigerians spent over N1 trillion on the importation of fake and sub-standard products last year, Mr Joseph Odumodu, the Director General of Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), has said.

Odumodu disclosed this yesterday in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja.

He said the imported items include electrical accessories, switches, batteries, used refrigerators and air conditioners and other environment degrading materials and junks.

He said most importers of second hand tyres "do not usually buy them but are paid to help dispose them of by foreign countries."

"The life span of a tyre in Europe and America ranges between four years and five years, and an average European or American will remove his tyres, even if they have not covered 10,000 km, for safety reasons," he said.

"Our people go to those sites where they keep tyres to pick them; actually they don't buy them.

"I am even told that they pay them to help them dispose of the tyres and where do they dispose the tyres but in Nigeria; so they bring them to us," he said.